No one will accept responsibility for such a catastrophic mess...

[kentuck]

And the press will never attempt to get to the bottom of it. Each Party will blame the other. After all, who would dare accept responsibility for such a disaster? Blame the other guy.

First of all, we should note that the Republicans have controlled the Congress and Senate since they won the elections in 1994 with Newt Gingrich and the Contract for (on) America up until January of last year. There was a law passed in the 1930's called the Glass-Steagal Act to prevent banks from investing in everything under the sun. It was necessary after the Wall Street crash in 1929 and the beginning of the Great Depression. The banks then, just like now, were over-leveraged, meaning they did not have the money to back up their guarantees.

In 1999?, Phil Gramm, Republican from Texas, sponsored a bill to repeal the Glass-Steagal Act. Bill Clinton signed it with the support of every single Republican and one Democrat. That loosened the floodgates and permitted the banks and investment firms like Bear-Stearns and Lehman Brothers and others, to invest in all types of tricky and complex arrangements, including CDS's (Credit Default Swaps) which are estimated to be in the range of $60 trillion dollars. Yep! Sixty Trillion Dollars !!! There is not enough money in the world to bail out this mess!

As for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, they were private firms that were assumed to be backed by the US government. They permitted realtors and bankers to sell houses to anyone, no matter how high the risk. These mortgages were "bundled" with other good mortgages and sold as "securities" to banks all around the world with the guarantee that they would be protected if they were to default. Ergo, Credit Default Swaps.

Both Parties used Fannie and Freddie like a cookie jar for campaign contributions. Both McCain and Obama accepted contributions from Fannie Mae. McCain's main adviser, Rick Davis, was on the payroll of Fannie Mae up until a month or so ago.

Basically, some people created complex investment schemes that we are now all paying for. But, in my opinion, it was the philosophy of the Republican Party that created the environment for the whole mess. The repeal of Glass Steagal. The doctrine that businesses do best when there is no regulation. De-regulate! De-regulate! That was their battle cry. There should be no oversight by government. The free market is God. Socialism is evil... until we need to bail out the big guys...then socialism is perfectly alright. It was this philosophy that took over the mindset of our Congress and Big Bankers and Wall Street and they forgot the history of the Great Depression and we are here today...

Nobody yet knows how awful this recession/depression is going to be. We are in the midst of a class war and the wealthy are going to do everything in their power to steal every penny they can from the rest of us to cover their own monumental misjudgments and financial losses. They will drain us dry.

[Warpy]

1. I'm afraid Clinton's legacy will be that he rubber stamped Gramm

and did nothing to overturn Reaganomics when he had the chance during his first two years with a Democratic Congress, opting instead to ram the GOP pet projects NAFTA and GATT through.

However, people out in workaday land seem to be putting the blame for this mess squarely where it belongs, on the ideology of the GOP.

The problem with the derivatives trade is that there isn't enough money in the world to back it up...unless you tap the people who benefited the most from it.

Unfortunately, as is always the case, our reactive government won't do that until the rest of us are at the gates, scaring them into action.

[Mist]

5. Did the repeal of Glass-Steagel have a veto-proof majority? If so, I'm

willing to cut Clinton some slack on that one.

[kentuck]

6. No.

The Republicans had a majority but not a veto-proof majority. The Democrats could have filibustered it, I suppose?

[jojo54]

2. This is where my frustration with government comes into play.

None of them, Democrats or Republicans, ever, ever, ever admit responsibility. Or, the blame gets passed down to a patsy.

None of them have back bones!

[seemslikeadream]

3. It is all our fault and we have to pay for it

but I would like to go to a resort first

[Mist]

4. When other criminals, such as bank robbers and burglars, get caught, their

"swag," (stolen stuff) is taken from them and returned to the owners. Why is this such an unthinkable idea for the ill-gotten gains of the banksters?